A team of teenage environmentalists from California has officially secured a Guinness World Record for recycling the most racquet sport balls in one day, after collecting approximately 22,000 used pickleballs and tennis balls — a total weight of 2,675 pounds — during an event held over the weekend of September 19. The balls were loaded onto trucks and sent to a specialized recycling facility, according to Good News Network.
The group operates under the name Another Bounce and works as part of the US-based 501(c)3 nonprofit Habits of Waste. Its mission centers on gathering used balls from clubs and parks in Los Angeles and directing them to a specialized recycling facility, while also pressing manufacturers to take responsibility for what happens to their products after use.
The scale of the problem is substantial. Roughly 500 million tennis, pickle, and racquet balls are sold, served, and discarded in the United States each year. Experts estimate that only between 1 and 5 percent of tennis and padel balls are kept out of landfills or incinerators. The remaining 95 to 99 percent either decompose over a period of 400 years or release greenhouse gases when burned.
During the record-setting weekend, student-athletes, families, local advocates, and community members came out to donate used balls. Organizers provided free ice cream to each family or community member who contributed a grocery bag filled with balls, and free new pickleballs were supplied by Selkirk.
The collected balls will be processed in partnership with recycling partner Ridwell, which will convert them into new balls or other sustainable materials. The recycled plastic is then pelletized into post-consumer resin and used to manufacture a range of commercial and industrial goods, including nursery plant pots, carpeting, and plastic packaging.
Habits of Waste founder Sheila Morovati praised the achievement, telling Good News Network that the record serves as a striking illustration of the waste produced by sports. Morovati, who previously set her own Guinness World Record in 2018 for collecting over a million gently-used crayons to donate to 700 teachers, said, "By diverting more than 20,000 balls from landfills, we're showing what's possible when we rethink the systems we've come to accept as the norm."
Morovati also told Good News Network that the event represents the start of a broader sustainability push in athletics, and she expressed enthusiasm about continuing to work with the teens to advocate for city ordinances and infrastructure that would drive meaningful change.
LA City Councilmember Traci Park attended the event to show support for the organization. Park told Good News Network, "I am so impressed with the work that they're doing to remove these balls from the waste stream because the impacts of the trash, the plastic and the pollution on our environment, especially on our sensitive marine habitat, is so impactful."
The record attempt was first reported by Good News Network in March, when the teens began their effort. The successful result was confirmed following the September collection event.
